How to Crack AWS Solution Architect — Associate (SAA-C02) in 60 Days (Tips & Tricks) — A Story

First of all, thank you so much for stopping by and I promise you — I would not waste the time you will spend reading this out.

AWS Certified Solutions Architect — Associate certification is one of the most demanding certifications in the market right now for getting a higher career move or higher compensation.

Since I had failed AWS Certified Solutions Architect — Associate (SAA-C01) on June 1, 2019, and then went ahead passing the new pattern SAA-C02 in Nov 2020, the steps I will be sharing with you all — are all coming from my experience.

AWS Solutions Architect — Associate (SAA-C01) happens to be my first cloud certification exam which I attempted in 2019. I was kind of fascinated and was looking for career growth at the same time since the retirement date of SAA-C01 was nearing hence I was in hurry to pass it well before that. But unfortunately, I failed the exam. I would not say that I did not work hard but sooner I realized the path I took was incorrect. Many people reached out to me asking for the path/steps to become AWS certified — so here are the steps I would suggest you all follow:

STEP 1 (1 Day)

• The first thing I always do while planning for any exam is to schedule it first. Hence, please schedule your exams first — Don't worry you will always have an option to pre/postpone your exam.
• This works for me since I always get the agility to be focused on my goal in terms of learning every day.

STEP 2 (2 Weeks)

After passing 20 cloud certifications I understood one thing loud & clear— Always, Always start with fundamentals/basic, which I did not do in 2019. So I would suggest you, folks, to start preparing with AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification first.

• Sign up below to participate in the challenge, earn a new AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner Certification between November 30 — December 11, 2020, and you’ll be eligible for a voucher for a future instructor-led class!
• Request Free AWS Cloud Practitioner Practice Exam Voucher — https://pages.awscloud.com/AWS-Global-Certification-Challenge-Practice-Exam-Request.html
• Get AWS Certified — https://pages.awscloud.com/NAMER-other-SP-Northeast-Cert-Challenge-2020-reg.html
• AWS Certified Global Challenge — https://pages.awscloud.com/Global-Challenge-Resources.html

Once you complete the training and have taken the practice exam, please take up your exam asap — don't wait.

STEP 3 (1 Day):

Once you pass your first AWS certification exam i.e. AWS Cloud Practitioner — Relax and celebrate for a day.

STEP 4 (2 Weeks):

Now, this is the time for you to level up the game and go for the next big one i.e. AWS Certified Solutions Architect — Associate.

• Start with Stephane Maarek’s Ultimate AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate 2020 Udemy courses: https://www.udemy.com/course/aws-certified-solutions-architect-associate-saa-c02/
• Stephane has done a wonderful job in terms of explaining each and every AWS service with a detailed hands-on lab exercise.

Trick: I wrote down the use cases of each and every service on a piece of paper to go through them later on while practicing hands-on. That helped me to answer quite a few questions in less than a min time during the actual exam.

STEP 5 (1 Week)

AWS Service White Papers for the major AWS services like EC2, S3, IAM, HA, Security, Databases, Serverless, VPC, and Route53: https://aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/?whitepapers-main.sort-by=item.additionalFields.sortDate&whitepapers-main.sort-order=desc

STEP 6 (1 Week)

Now you are ready to go and practice — Jon Bonso AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate Practice Exams.

• Don’t check for the answers.
• First, take the test and see how much you score and then read & understand the explanations. Until you get 90% in each test, keep practicing https://www.udemy.com/course/aws-certified-solutions-architect-associate-amazon-practice-exams-saa-c02/

STEP 7 (1 Week)

• Next would be the Whizlabs practice tests of AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate.
• Same advice here as well, don’t check for the answers. First, take the test and see how much you score and then read & understand the explanations. Until you get 90% in each test, keep practicing.

STEP 8 (1 Day) — Optional

• If you have cleared the AWS Cloud Practitioner exam, you might have received the free practice exam voucher, which you can take up for SAA-C02.
• Sample Questions: https://d1.awsstatic.com/training-and-certification/docs/AWS_Certified_Solutions_Architect_Associate_Sample_Questions.pdf

STEP 9 (1 Day)

• Go to Ryan Kroonenburg — A Cloud Guru (https://www.udemy.com/course/aws-certified-solutions-architect-associate/) Udemy course and go through the EXAM TIPS, for each service.
• Personally, I found the exam tips to be really helpful for me to recall the use cases of all the required AWS services.

STEP 10 (3 Days)

What's Next? You still have 3 days.

• Download the PDF of the entire session of Stephane’s course and go through it and exam tips from Ryan’s course. (1 Day)
• Take up all 6 practice exams from Jon Bonso and aim to get 95% (1 Day)
• Go through the notes you have prepared so far on the use cases of the AWS services (1 day)

YOU ARE READY! GO FOR YOUR EXAM NOW — DONT DELAY. All the best.

You will be a little nervous but that’s ok. “Confidence is what we get when we take fear, face it and replace it.” ― Tim Fargo

Here’s my LinkedIn Post on AWS Solutions Architect Associate — https://lnkd.in/e2WK5dB

Things to avoid: Many people including me take a good amount of break from learning after completing the Cloud Practitioner Exam due to which many of the times the motivation and knowledge fade away hence don't stop after completing you fundamentals exam, else during SAA you will have to start fresh once again which will be tough.

If you’ve found this story helpful, please give a thumbs up and share it with the community for people's benefit.

Thank you so much and wish you all the success!